Ulster v Connacht Friday February 4 8:15pm KO BBC2NI / TG4 / Premier Sports 1

[Neill_M]

Connacht 23:

Buckley, Delahunt, Tuimauga, Murray, Dowling, Prendergast, Oliver, Butler, Marmion, Fitzgerald, Wooton, Daly, Arnold, Sullivan, Porch

Murphy, Duggan, McGrath, Fifita, Boyle, Reilly, Forde, McNulty

[Neill_M]

Hume sole Ulsterman in Ireland 23, wearing the 23 shirt. Henderson not fit enough yet.

[StandUp]

Hume sole Ulsterman in Ireland 23, wearing the 23 shirt. Henderson not fit enough yet.

FIRFU

[jean valjean]

This should be a good game. I was thinking it could be a loss but with the players back I would hope we can get the right result. Front row and back row need to get parity but there is enough in the backs to cause some damage.

[StandUp]

Buckley v Milosinovich…… I’ll be watching the scrums through my fingers.
Big Stu should keep their defence honest though.
Cautiously looking forward to this.

[paddybrown]

Hume sole Ulsterman in Ireland 23, wearing the 23 shirt. Henderson not fit enough yet.

FIRFU

I reckon they've done us a favour for once. They've released Lowry, Baloucoune and Timoney to us for tomorrow, but they haven't let Jack Carty go back to Connacht.

No internationals the weekend we play Dragons, but we play Leinster the same day Ireland play England. We'll see how many players they let us have back for those ones.

[justinr73]

Maybe they’ll be wrapped in cotton wool ahead of their token game against Italy.

It’d be nice to think that AF finds a way to play one or two of the new lads in each meaningful game, perhaps in the fashion that Hansen and Hume are to get capped on Saturday.

[Big-al]

This is a big game in the season. A Connacht win brings them right back on ulsters tail and with a tour to SA and a hard enough run in, ulster won’t need that.

[solidarity]

Ulster 23:

Warwick, Andrew, Milasinovich, AOC, Carter, Jones, Rea, Vermeulen, Doak, Burns, McIlroy, McCloskey, Curtis, Baloucoune, Lowry

Moore, Reid, Kane, Kearney, Timoney, Shanahan, Moxham, Lyttle.

That team'll do for me. We can be a bit more optimistic than I'd feared.

[Bart S]

My biggest concern will be the scrums. Warwick is the only 1 of the 4 props I would confident in but hope to be pleasantly surprised. Not expecting as much involvement in the loose (particularly handling) as we have seen from Marty and EOS recently, until Reid comes on. If the others can keep the scrum solid they’ll have done a decent job.

With scrum parity Ulster should get a decent win.

[big mervyn]

Most useless stat of the week:

McCloskey, O'Connor and Warwick all make their 147th appearance for Ulster.

Maximum points are a given

[UlsterNo9]

Most useless stat of the week:

McCloskey, O'Connor and Warwick all make their 147th appearance for Ulster.

Maximum points are a given

To misquote Nigel Owen's "This is not snooker"

[Bart S]

Most useless stat of the week:

McCloskey, O'Connor and Warwick all make their 147th appearance for Ulster.

Maximum points are a given

To misquote Nigel Owen's "This is not snooker"

Right on cue there chaps

[Bart S]

Merv - do you know how many games Hendy has played for Ulster over the past 2 and a half seasons? Seems like he is regularly injured or under IRFU restrictions/away on international duty to the extent that it’s probably on a par with sexton’s appearances for Leinster over the same period but maybe the reality is different.

[big mervyn]

Merv - do you know how many games Hendy has played for Ulster over the past 2 and a half seasons? Seems like he is regularly injured or under IRFU restrictions/away on international duty to the extent that it’s probably on a par with sexton’s appearances for Leinster over the same period but maybe the reality is different.

He made his 100th appearance on January 18 2019, so 23 further appearances in just over 3 years. Not a great return for Ulster.

22 caps for Ireland in the same period btw